Dáil debates

Friday, 17 June 2005

Morris Tribunal: Statements.

 

10:30 am

Photo of Michael McDowellMichael McDowell (Dublin South East, Progressive Democrats)

I think it has its origin in a development of a relationship between Government and the Garda Síochána and the emergence of the operation of an independent prosecutorial office in 1974 under the Prosecution of Offences Act 1974. As a result, the pendulum swung away from direct accountability to the Government of the day and to the law officer in charge of advising the Government and conducting civil proceedings and swung towards the point where what was termed operational accountability of the Garda Síochána had in fact got to the point where the Garda believed — and I believe it was in good faith — that it was in a position to withhold information or to decide what information could be supplied to members of the Executive and to the Executive's legal adviser, the Attorney General at the time.

As the House will appreciate and I ask Members to bear this in mind, in the early years of the formation of the State and perhaps for the first 40 or 50 years of the life of the Garda Síochána, the Commissioner was appointed from within the Department of Justice and the relationship with the Department of Justice was formed on that basis——

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